Composite comb blade for a clipper



Oct. 18, 1966 M. ANDIS 3,279,061

COMPOSITE COMB BLADE FOR A CLIPPER Filed June 24, 1964 l N VE N TOR. Mn/m 4W5 M, MLMM United States Patent ()ffice 3,279,051 Patented Oct. 18, 1966 3,279 061 COMPOSITE COMB BLADE FOR A CLIPPER Mathew Andis, Racine, Wis., assignor to And1s Cl1pper Co., Racine, Wis., a corporation of Wisconsin Filed June 24, 1964, Ser. No. 377,708 Claims. (Cl. 30-200) This invention relates to a composite comb blade for a clipper. The present application is a continuation-inpart of my application Serial No. 285,392, filed June 4, 1963 and contains claims divided therefrom.

For certain hair cutting operations, barbers desire very thick comb blades. However, because of the difiiculty and expense involved in the production of such blades by methods previously known, manufacturers have heretofore tried to satisfy the demand for ultra-thick blades by selling separately fabricated spacer attachments which slip over the conventional comb blade to move the area of cut outwardly from the customers scalp.

Such spacers are, at best, makeshifts because they do not fit with precision the teeth of the comb blade to which they are attached. In fact they almost invariably have fewer teeth than the comb blade and consequently are incapable of picking up in one pass all of the hair traversed. Consequently, several passes are normally required to do the work that a comb blade of the same thickness would accomplish in a single pass.

Spacers are conventionally made of plastic and have from one-half to three-fourths as many teeth as the comb blade. Because of the discrepancy in number of teeth, the strands of hair are in bunches which are accumulated anywhere from three-eighths to an inch away from the skull and they cannot be resegregated and forced between the teeth of the comb blade. Some of the hair will bend over and slide beneath the comb blade. Without a spacer, every strand of hair will be held between the teeth of the comb blade at skull level and will necessarily be out before being bent at the ends of the grooves.

The present invention provides a structure and method whereby comb blades of any desired thickness can be produced for sale at a reasonable price. The cutter proper, or the upper portion of the comb blade upon which the shear blade rests, is made of steel. The shoe or lower portion is made of aluminum or the like. It also may be made of plastic. The two portions have teeth in full registry and, when assembled, function unitarily as a single blade, equal in quality to a blade made of a single piece of steel, but with the advantage that the weight is less than that of an all-steel comb blade and the cost is only 30 to 40 percent higher than the cost of a conventional comb blade. This is perhaps a quarter as much as it would cost to make a comb blade one-half inch thick from a solid block of steel. The machining time is only about one-tenth of the time that would be required if the part were made entirely of steel.

The steel cutter section of the assembled blade is manufactured with far less work than a regular clipper comb blade. It does not require the rear end recess nor the bevel nor the rills which are conventionally used on a regular clipper comb blade. The blank can be ground parallel on both faces before and/or after hardening and this operation can be performed concurrently upon a number of blanks many times greater than is possible in conventional practice.

According to the present application, the teeth of the relatively soft non-ferrous shoe and those of the steel cutter section of the blade assembly are not merely in registry but are interlocked to maintain them positively in alignment. Although the teeth are extremely thin the upper rear end of each tooth of the shoe is vertically grooved to mate with a rib formed on the complementary forward end of the corresponding tooth of the steel cutter section. The ribs and grooves may be of any appropriate form. For example, they may be of rectangular cross section or, as in the preferred embodiment shown in FIG. 5, may be of triangular cross section.

In the drawings:

FIG. 1 is a bottom plan view of a composite comb blade embodying the invention.

FIG. 2 is a view in elevation of the blade shown in FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 is a view on a reduced scale showing in perspective the relatively spaced cutting section and shoe of the composite comb blade illustrated in FIGS. 1 and 2.

FIG. 4 is a view taken in section on the line 44 of FIG. 1.

FIG. 5 is a fragmentary detail view on an enlarged scale taken in the plane indicated at 5-5 in FIG. 2.

FIG. 6 is a view similar to FIG. 5 but showing a modified form of tongue and groove.

FIG. 7 is a view similar to FIGS. 5 and 6 showing a further modified form of tongue and groove.

The clipper with which the composite blade is used may be of any design. Since the cooperating parts of a hair clipper are shown in the companion application above mentioned, the drawings of this present application are limited to the composite blade per se.

The hard cutter plate section 30 has bearing surfaces 22 and 26 upon which reciprocate the clipper shear blade (not shown). The bearing surface 22 adjacent the forward end 32 of plate 30 is penetrated by slots 34 cut into the plate from its forward end to define shear teeth 36 with which coact the teeth of the reciprocable shear blade (not shown).

Cutter plate section 30 rests upon a shoe section 42 of the composite comb blade. Various shoe sections of different thickness may be provided for interchangeable connection with the cutter plate section 30. Shoe section 42 has a bed area at 43 upon which the cutter plate section 30 is fixed by suitable screws 47. Bed 43 terminates at a transverse shoulder 45. At the shoulder 45 the rear extremities of the teeth 40 rise above the bed 43. These are vertically grooved as hereinafter described. Ahead of the shoulder the teeth of the shoe taper forwardly to an apex 44 as clearly shown in FIGS. 2, 3 and 4. Extending rearwardly of the shoe section from its apex 44 and intersecting the seat 43 are the parallel slots 46 which form the teeth 40. The slots 46 of the shoe section register with the slots 34 of the cutter plate section. The teeth 40 formed by slots 46 register with the teeth 36 of the cutter plate section, there being a precision joint between the teeth of the respective sections at the shoulder 45 of shoe section 42.

In the companion application above identified, the joint between the teeth of the cutter plate section and the shoe section was a butt joint. However, it has been found desirable as a means of maintaining the teeth in precisely aligned registration that the joint include ribs and grooves such as are exemplified in FIGS. 5 to 7 of this application. In the preferred construction of FIG. 5, each of the teeth 40 has a rearwardly facing groove 48 to horizontally triangular cross section, and each registering tooth 36 of the hardened steel comb place section 30 has a complementary rib 50 formed by machining its entire forward end to provide terminal surfaces converging to an apex 52 received into the groove 48 as clearly shown in FIG. 5. When the parts are assembled, each tooth is individually keyed to the tooth with which it registers, whereby registration is positively maintained.

The construction of FIG. 6 is similar except that the groove 480 and the rib 500 are so cut as to provide lateral shoulders 53. The construction shown in FIG. 7 provides a groove at 481 which is of rectangular cross 3 section, the rib 501 being correspondingly formed. The shoulders 521 are similar to those shown in FIG. 6 except that they have relatively greater lateral extent. All of the constructions are good but because of the very thin teeth involved, the construction of FIG. is much easier to make.

As explained in the companion application'above identified, the cutter section 30 is preferably made of hardened steel whereas the shoe section 42 of the composite shoe plate is preferably made of much lighter and softer material. To avoid expansion and contraction due to moisture, the material is preferably metal rather than plastic. Aluminum or magnesium or alloys thereof are entirely satisfactory. Machining for mounting the assembly is facilitated by the softness of the material used in.the shoe.

To facilitate manufacture, the shoe plate section 42 is desirably undercut at 54 transversely beneath the rear extremities of the teeth 40, thus giving clearance into which a broach may be operated in cutting the vertical grooves 48.

I claim:

1. A composite hair clipper comb blade comprising in unitary assembly a relatively hard cutter blade .section and a less hard shoe section, said sections having teeth closely spaced laterally and which register to provide longitudinal continuity of teeth across portions of said sections, the teeth of the shoe section and the teeth of the cutter blade section individually having mating edges and vertical interlocking rib and groove means on their respective mating edges for maintaining them in registry.

2. A composite hair clipper comb blade according to claim 1 in which the ribs and grooves of the respective teeth are of triangular cross section.

3. A composite comb blade according to claim 1 in d. which the ribs and grooves of the respective teeth are of rectangular cross section.

4. A composite hair clipper comb blade according to claim 1 in which the shoe section has a shoulder across which its teeth extend and against which the teeth of the cutter blade section are seated, the teeth of the shoe section having a channel undercut at said shoulder which underlies the vertical interlocking rib and groove means aforesaid.

5. A multiple-part com-b blade for a hair clipper comprising in unitary assembly a shoe section having a bed surface and a shoulder rising above said surface from which tapered shoe teeth extend forwardly and downwardly to a forward apex, the teeth having rear ends adjacent the shoulder respectively provided with transverse grooves at the plane of the bed surface and With vertical grooves opening into the transverse grooves, and a blade section resting upon said bed surface and having teeth aligned with the shoe teeth and registering with and abutting the rear ends of the tapered teeth of the shoe section, the blade section provided with vertically extending tongue portions engaged in respective grooves of aligned shoe teeth, whereby the registering teeth of the respective sections are held positively in alignment.

References Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 317,671 5/1885 Priest 30-200 339,811 4/1886 Reinhardt et a1. 30-200 347,207 8/1886 Smith et al. 30201 708,464 9/1902 Coates 30'20O 1,214,430 1/1917 Cook 30'200 WILLIAM FELDMAN, Primary Examiner.

J. C. PETERS, Assistant Examiner. 

1. A COMPOSITE HAIR CLIPPER COMB BLADE COMPRISING IN UNITARY ASSEMBLY A RELATIVELY HARD CUTTER BLADE SECTION AND A LESS HARD SHOE SECTION, SAID SECTIONS HAVING TEETH CLOSELY SPACED LATERALLY AND WHICH REGISTER TO PROVIDE LONGITUDINALLY CONTINUITY OF TEETH ACROSS PORTIONS OF SAID SECTIONS, THE TEETH OF THE SHOE SECTION AND THE TEETH OF THE CUTTER BLADE SECTION INDIVIDUALLY HAVING MATING EDGES AND VERTICAL INTERLOCKING RIB AND GROOVE MEANS ON THEIR RESPECTIVE MATING EDGES FOR MAINTAINING THEM IN REGISTRY. 